When Walt Disney Imagineering was play testing new ways theme park visitors could interact with bounty hunters and rebel spies in Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge it turned for help to an unlikely character: Captain Jack Sparrow from the “Pirates of the Caribbean” film franchise.

Imagineering employed the eccentric pirate during a series of in-park play tests to work out the logistics of the story-driven interactive experiences that will take place in the Black Spire Outpost village on the Star Wars planet of Batuu, the setting for new themed lands coming to Disneyland and Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida.

Imagineering plans to do away with the traditional queues in Galaxy’s Edge where visitors wait for meet-and-greet souvenir photo opportunities with a Disney character.

“To the extent that we can, we’re avoiding the trope of the meet-and-greet and really leaning towards engaging with characters in a way that makes sense for the story you decided you want to have,” Imagineering portfolio creative executive Scott Trowbridge said.

Instead of merely posing for snapshots, visitors will become the hero in their own Star Wars story and engage in interactive experiences with rebel spy Vi Moradi or a ferocious and grumpy bounty hunter named Harkos.

You might run into Vi near a X-wing fighter docked in a hidden Resistance base camp just outside of the Black Spire village and be asked to participate in a mission to infiltrate the First Order.

Crash the Millennium Falcon while on the Smugglers Run flight simulator attraction and Harkos might tap you on the shoulder in Oga’s Cantina looking for the galactic credits you owe a space pirate for damaging the fastest hunk of junk in the galaxy.

But how would Disney theme park visitors respond to such a new and innovative way of interacting with Star Wars characters in Galaxy’s Edge? Imagineering needed to find out before the new Star Wars land opened to the public.

“One of the things that we have done over the time we’ve been developing this project is we’ve been kind of subtly doing some play tests,” Trowbridge said.

That’s where the Captain of the Black Pearl comes in. Disney conducted a series of play tests several years ago with the swaggering slightly drunken pirate at Walt Disney World in Florida.

“If Captain Jack Sparrow was just walking through the land, how would guests react?” Trowbridge asked. “And how can we create constructs that allow the story-driven experience?. How can we let those story-driven experiences happen and still allow people to get the photo they want, but not turn it into a line of people waiting to take photos?”

Little did Disney World visitors know at the time that they were helping shape the interactive character experiences coming to the new Star Wars land.

“When we did that play test, we never said anything about Star Wars,” Trowbridge said. “We never said anything about why we were doing it. For us, it was to learn the very subtle tools and techniques that allow us to do those things and to solve those problems.”

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Were the play tests successful? Imagineering will soon find out when Galaxy’s Edge debuts at Disneyland.

“We’ve tried to do our homework and set ourselves up for success,” Trowbridge said. “Ultimately we’ll find out. There’s still some things we won’t know until we fill the land with folks and see what resonates.”

However things turn out, they’ll have Jack Sparrow to thank. Or blame. It wouldn’t be the first time the shrewd trickster caused some trouble.

“I’m certain there are things that we will adjust and tweak on the fly for sure,” Trowbridge said.

Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge debuts on May 31 at Disneyland in California and Aug. 29 at Disney’s Hollywood Studios in Florida.

Brady MacDonald is a theme park reporter for the Orange County Register and the Southern California News Group. He’s covered the theme park industry for more than 25 years. He writes about Disney, Universal, Six Flags, SeaWorld, Cedar Fair and Legoland parks in Southern California, across the United States and around the world. As a member of the SCNG Features team, he also writes about entertainment, travel, pop culture, music, restaurants and craft beer.

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